KING CRIMSON — Islands (review)

KING CRIMSON — Islands album cover Album · 1971 · Proto-Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
4/5 ·
Warthur
Another somewhat muddled album from the chaos that engulfed the band following In the Court of the Crimson King, Islands features yet another almost entirely new lineup coalescing about the core of Robert Fripp and soon-to-be-released lyricist Peter Sinfield.

The major change from In the Wake of Poseidon or Lizard is that the Islands-era lineup had a chanced to spend a few months performing live concerts before they entered the studio to produce the album; indeed, the expansive Sailors' Tales boxed set of soundboard recordings from the era reveals that most of the songs here (aside from the title track and Song of the Gulls) had received extensive live workouts during the preceding tour, which allowed them to add extra refinement to them.

The album includes some fine tracks like the gentle and haunting title track or Formentera Lady, or the riotous and dark Sailor's Tale (which prefigures the musical direction which the band would soon embrace with Lark's Tongues, Starless and Red phase of their career, though with a somewhat jazzy tone to it - at points it feels like something that Zappa and the Mothers might have turned out in their more serious moments). The Letters, whilst I'm not quite so fond of it, has grown on me over time, as has the classical piece Song of the Gulls - the latter still feels a bit like filler, but it's unobjectionable and makes a nice intro to Islands.

At the same time, whilst the album has grown on me - and the new mix by Fripp and Steven Wilson teases out some of its best aspects - I'm still not keen on Ladies of the Road. You may or may not consider it sexist (I personally do), but it's hard to deny that it's incredibly cliched, the lyrical subject matter tackling the tired-out old subject of groupie sex (Zappa and the Mothers did it better on Fillmore East) and the musical backing being completely forgettable.

The next studio album would see Fripp abandon all efforts to recreate the success of In the Court of the Crimson King and abandon the symphonic prog field entirely, pioneering a new, angular, heavy direction in progressive music and finally regaining the status of creative visionary and spawner of genres that he briefly attained in 1969; as such, Islands has been overshadowed somewhat over the years. The improved recent mix proves to be a big help in discovering a new appreciation for the material.
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